Rear World Difference

I think I know the answer already, but I can't find any benchmarks to confirm. Unless I just don't understand the benchmarks that I've seen - which is possible. Basically I'm trying to decide if the 4.2 i7 vs the 3.8 i5 will give me noticeable, time saving differences for my use. I've been doing more video editing and encoding lately. Lot's of time taking clips from friends and family from weekend trips, parties, backyard fun, etc. and mashing them into something watchable and catering to everyone's formatting needs. I probably mess with a few hours worth of video, editing and encoding, per week.

I'm wondering if anyone can tell/show me what sort of time savings I could expect with the i7 over the i5. I know that can be vague, so maybe the following chart will help give you an idea of what I'm looking for. In their example the i7 was only only 11 seconds faster at the conversion. Since it was only a 6gb 4k file, I'm guessing it was only a 60 second clip or something small.

If the i7 will save me 10 or 15 minutes per hour of video, to me it would definitely be worth it. But if were talking maybe a minute or 2 tops, then it's not. I'm not looking for someone to give me an exact amount of time savings, I know that's not possible, I just want to know really if it's noticeable. I'm just guessing, but I'm guessing that hyperthreading of the i7 will be noticeable the longer and longer it goes. So while this small file didn't have much of a difference, when we're talking hours worth of video, the difference will start to be more and more noticeable, but I'm not sure.

An SSD would make real-world performance much better; that'll be the real noticeable difference.

If you're going full Flash, it's worth upgrading to an i7 too as the difference will certainly help for encoding or converting longer videos. But if you're sticking with HDD/Fusion, I'd sooner upgrade that to pure SSD than get the i7.

An SSD would make real-world performance much better; that'll be the real noticeable difference.

If you're going full Flash, it's worth upgrading to an i7 too as the difference will certainly help for encoding or converting longer videos. But if you're sticking with HDD/Fusion, I'd sooner upgrade that to pure SSD than get the i7.

Click to expand...

I'm definitely getting the SSD which is what made me consider the i7 more and more. Figured if I had to BTO I might as well examine all options. Was just wondering if there were more time based benchmarks.

I'm facing a similar debate between the 512 SSD base i5/570 and splurging on the i7/580 w/SSD. I'll probably keep the machine for 5+ years so the more power the better I assume, even though my current usage is mostly light personal use and as a Plex server. The fan noise reports have generated doubts so I'm watching these threads to help make up my mind.

That's another reason why I sort of wanted to see just how big of a benefit the i7 could be to me. I can deal with fan noise, but I better be getting something in return. If it's fan noise and only saving me 2-3 minutes total per week, then it's not worth it.

That's another reason why I sort of wanted to see just how big of a benefit the i7 could be to me. I can deal with fan noise, but I better be getting something in return. If it's fan noise and only saving me 2-3 minutes total per week, then it's not worth it.

Click to expand...

You get a lot more performance from the i7. A lot more. It's hyperthreaded so essentially you have double the cores that software has to work with. A solid 30% performance increase too. It's definitely noticeable and although it's not absolutely necessary, it's really great for piece of mind and should ensure system longevity if down the line you find yourself using more system resources.

A lot of this depends a lot on your specific editing/encoding methodology. Some apps can't take advantage of the 8 cores. Even in Handbrake your main encode could be multi-threaded, but you may be using a filter or feature that could only be single-threaded.

Personally I queue up all my encodes and let them run overnight anyway, so it matters a lot less to me. I can save the coin.

For Handbrake I usually don't change it too much from default settings on whichever format I'm using. Just being for friends and family, if it's not 100% pixel perfect, they'll get over it or they can do it themselves . Some of the things I am keeping for myself I do play with settings more though.

I have the i7 w/SSD in my bag, just waiting for back to school sale to see if they do anything cool for it and to let some other people play with it first to make sure there weren't any insanely bad issues pop up such as overheating or display issues. Figured while I waited it wouldn't hurt to get some more specific opinions. I'm getting antsy to see just how badly this thing crushes a base model 21" from 2011.

just waiting for back to school sale to see if they do anything cool for it and to let some other people play with it first to make sure there weren't any insanely bad issues pop up such as overheating or display issues.

Click to expand...

again, same plan over here. I don't tend to do a single processor intense task, but run multiple moderate level tasks simultaneously and don't want anything to slow down.

That's another reason why I sort of wanted to see just how big of a benefit the i7 could be to me. I can deal with fan noise, but I better be getting something in return. If it's fan noise and only saving me 2-3 minutes total per week, then it's not worth it.

Click to expand...

I am also in the same position, deciding which is best for me. I am also fine with the fan noise but not the heat issue. It is never good for electronics to be constantly exposed to high temperature. They may not last long.

I am also in similar position except for me fan noise is what's most important. I watch a lot of 4k contents and video edits time to time. What's most bothering with my 2013 15" rmbp 750m is that when I fast forward 4k youtube videos with mouse a few times then the fan goes out max. I am curious of if the new iMac will be able to handle that. I am leaning towards i5 and maybe 570 since they have all same heatsink and fans and obviously less heat is the better. Money is not non-issue.

The benchmarks you listed are showing about 8% difference in speed. While I trust hardwarecanucks I feel that is the absolute minimum difference you will see in transcode times between the 7600K and the 7700K. Other reviewers have shown up to 30% difference in Handbrake. Average user benchmarks at Userbenchmark shows about 18%.

Regardless the amount of time saved will come down to the project. If it takes you 5 minutes to export something then 8-30% faster isn't that big of a deal. However I've transcoded bluray rips and my own projects through Handbrake on veryslow, with high levels of denoise and other filters and its taken 7+ hours. 8-30% of that is significant, in theory that could be 2+ hours of time saved. (I'm using an i5-4670 which is ~50% slower on average benchmarks than the 7700K so keep that in mind).

If you don't mind fan noise I would go with the 7700K. It will benefit your particular workload and offer features your particular type of workload can benefit from like hyper threading.

Both the 7600K and 7700K have TDP of 91w but the 7700K will run hotter. I've found anything over 85w TDP as rated by Intel will cause the iMac fan to lift off the 1200 RPM minimum under heavy load. I haven't done any research but I would be curious of what 7600K owners have experience fan wise under a heavy load like transcoding for long lengths of time.

For me personally I would go with the i5-7600 (65w TDP) be patient and enjoy the silence. I can't stand a PC I can hear from the other room for HOURS of transcoding. Been nice if Apple would have offered the i7-7700 in place of the i5-7600K since it has similar performance but lower TDP. OR if they just made the cooling system better so this wasn't an issue to begin with. I find it crazy I'm considering an iMac Pro because I want a quieter machine (assumption).

Regardless the amount of time saved will come down to the project. If it takes you 5 minutes to export something then 8-30% faster isn't that big of a deal. However I've transcoded bluray rips and my own projects through Handbrake on veryslow, with high levels of denoise and other filters and its taken 7+ hours. 8-30% of that is significant, in theory that could be 2+ hours of time saved. (I'm using an i5-4670 which is ~50% slower on average benchmarks than the 7700K so keep that in mind).

If you don't mind fan noise I would go with the 7700K. It will benefit your particular workload and offer features your particular type of workload can benefit from like hyper threading.

Both the 7600K and 7700K have TDP of 91w but the 7700K will run hotter. I've found anything over 85w TDP as rated by Intel will cause the iMac fan to lift off the 1200 RPM minimum under heavy load. I haven't done any research but I would be curious of what 7600K owners have experience fan wise under a heavy load like transcoding for long lengths of time.

For me personally I would go with the i5-7600 (65w TDP) be patient and enjoy the silence. I can't stand a PC I can hear from the other room for HOURS of transcoding. Been nice if Apple would have offered the i7-7700 in place of the i5-7600K since it has similar performance but lower TDP. OR if they just made the cooling system better so this wasn't an issue to begin with. I find it crazy I'm considering an iMac Pro because I want a quieter machine (assumption).

Click to expand...

Thanks for the info, it was quite helpful. I'm on a sandy bridge 2.7 i5 and according to http://cpu.userbenchmark.com/Compare/Intel-Core-i7-7700K-vs-Intel-Core-i5-2500S/3647vsm1699 the 4.2 i7 in the 2017's is going to be insanely better, 100%+ in some areas. I'm currently doing some transcoding and it's been going for a little over an hour now. 156-159 degree CPU temps and CPU fan going between 1900 and 2000 rpms and I cannot hear it over the spinner external sitting next to my machine unless I put my ear right up next to the computer. Aside from the high temps, one transcode is taking nearly 2 hours, and another I'm estimating close to 3 on this setup. This effectively renders my machine useless for the next 5-6 hours. If I can cut that time in half, I'll deal with fan noise lol.

I'm curious if the older machines are "quieter" because they have multiple fans vs the 2017's just having 1 fan. I'm assuming my 3 fans are each relatively small and near the openings, vs the 2017 iMac which is probably larger and possibly not right next to an opening. Reason I'm asking is even at 2200 rpm I can't hear my cpu fan at all, but if I turn the HDD AND Cpu fan on to 1800 rpm's you can hear them easily, and if you turn them both to 2200-2500, the neighbors can probably hear them. Maybe my single cpu fan is going faster, but not moving as much air and it's straight to the open rather than bouncing around inside for a while and so it's quieter. I have no idea if any of that is possible or not, just a random thought.

MacRumors attracts a broad audience
of both consumers and professionals interested in
the latest technologies and products. We also boast an active community focused on
purchasing decisions and technical aspects of the iPhone, iPod, iPad, and Mac platforms.